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Two Rider students and one administrator traveled to the White House to meet Michelle Obama on Jan. 13, after the University was among those selected out of the 350 colleges that participated in the Healthy Campus Challenge. 

The initiative called for colleges across the country to use their talents to make their campus and local communities aware of healthcare’s importance to young adults and the economy.

Though the event was attended largely by other university administrators, Rider sent senior Evan Giguere and junior Kelsey Johnson, two students who spread awareness  of the Challenge on social media, along with Dean of College of Continuing Studies Boris Vilic to accept a certificate naming Rider as a White House Healthy Campus.

“This was an outstanding platform to showcase our students’ skills, while helping other members of our community find out how to live healthy lives,” says Vilic, who served as the university liaison in communication with the Department of Health.

During Rider’s awareness efforts, Giguere, co-president of the С����Ƶ Network (R.U.N.),  student organization that produces television programs and videos available online and on campus, and Johnson, a student from Professor Anne Carroll’s Healthcare Financing class, were just two of several students who worked on putting the social media campaign to raise awareness. 

“The healthcare knowledge from the healthcare financing class combined with my video skills came together to create a project that really shows the kind of collaboration we, as students, excel in,” Giguere says.

During the collaboration, Giguere says, R.U.N. wanted to add a twist to one of the ideas provided by the United States Department of Health. 

“We received some sample scripts and ‘you never know what could happen’ was one theme that we liked, so we ran with it from there,” says Giguere. “We thought using different musical genres would be a fun way to get people’s attention.